For some strange reason, most probably naivety on my part, I thought that the Reaper Bones Kickstarter whole point was to add the capability of Reaper to produce Bones (plastic) miniatures in large numbers. What I didn't realize is that the purpose was for a second company in China to produce the miniatures for Reaper. This, apparently adds about 5 weeks to the shipping process, and makes Reaper subject to whatever delays the mysterious secondary company might suffer.
I probably should be surprised, just about everything is made in China these days.
So yeah, this Kickstarter is either shipped or not shipped, depending on whether you had add-ons to your order or not.
I'm in the "not shipped" category.
As of May 14th, this was the latest:
We are currently waiting on only 4 more shipments (Containers) from China, the last of which should be leaving China about one week from today!
It normally takes 3-6 weeks from ship date to arrive at our dock, with 5 weeks being the Average.
As things arrive over the next few weeks we will be able to resume shipping orders, but we are thinking that the bulk of your orders will be waiting for that last shipment to arrive.Which would restart shipping at the end of June / early July I guess.
Then there is the secondary effect of the Bones Kickstarter, which is apparently tying up product to the point that retailers aren't able to effectively stock the line of miniatures anymore. Heck, if you go to the Reaper site itself you'll notice they haven't added a New Release PDF since October of 2012.
I guess success can be too much of a good thing...
Wow.. I admit.. thats kinda stupid.
ReplyDeleteI was getting agitated by the KS starting last month. Being late, I can handle, to a point. What I didn't care for was the complete lack of information until this week.
ReplyDeleteTo me, this is unprofessional on Reaper's part. Sure they cannot expedite the shipping process, but when they began to see the success of their Kickstarter they should have made logistical plans to facilitate this.
I started typing up a rant, but I'll save you from that as it's long and that's not the point of my post.
Anyways, here is to hoping Reaper gets this mess sorted out ASAP.
Yeah, they seem overwhelmed.
ReplyDeleteThis is the only Kickstarter I've ever backed, I'm very pessimistic by nature but I thought given Reaper's cast-iron rep it was a pretty sure thing to ship within a couple months of estimated fulfilment. Well, my friend who only ordered Vampire and intra-Vampire add ons indeed got her stuff in April, but I went for Kaladrax etc and now I'm worried my stuff won't get to me here in the UK before my mid-August vacation.
I'm bummed that my minis aren't coming any time soon, but I'm perfectly willing to be patient. I'll get them eventually.
ReplyDeleteI hope moving some production in-house pays off for them in the long run.
Part of the reason for the kickstarter was so Reaper could buy their own plastic injection machine.
ReplyDeleteThey do seem a little overwhelmed though at their own success...
And I'm in the same boat, waiting on my minis.
that's what i remembered - but as the Bones are coming from China, it appears that isn't helping the current round of production
DeleteThey've been running 14 machines in China from September to April full time. They only just got the one in Texas a little while ago, and all the molds are still in China.
DeleteFor the record, Reaper was up front about the Kickstarter minis being produced in China, with the Kickstarters success allowing them to move production to Texas at some point in the future. See Update #19, 1:33 into the video.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.kickstarter.com/projects/1513061270/reaper-miniatures-bones-an-evolution-of-gaming-min/posts/285805
The kickstarter also derailed their metal mini production schedule. I supported the kickstarter at the "metal minis for a year" level and we while we have received quite a few metals, Reaper sent me an email saying that they had missed their metal productions and offered to extend the time line or provide a gift certificate that I could use at the store for anything in exchange.
ReplyDelete